Mallorca!

Tuesday, November 9

Hola blog followers, (McKayla here)

Yesterday morning at 6am we landed by boat on the Spanish Island of Mallorca. This wasn't our original plan, but I think we are all completely satisfied with our decision to spend the last week of our trip, before heading to Madrid, in this incredibly beautiful place. Mallorca is a travel destination for many cyclist because the island has it all...mountains, cliffs, scenic coastal bike paths, rolling hills, and fantastic pavement for road bikes. Hiking is also very popular on the island's northwestern mountains which offer spectacular ocean views from the top.

We spent Sunday creating plans for the week, only to change them multiple times when we learned that you can't take bikes on high speed trains in Spain. We were going to train to Sevilla, bike to Granada, and then train back to Madrid, but after that plan fell through Amie and Erin suggested we go to Mallorca. Amie's brother, Anthony, spend five weeks rock climbing on the island last spring and only had great things to say about it. Our seven hour ferry (an enormous cruise ship) left Barcelona at 11pm, and we slept in a cabin with bunks right through the entire ride. At sunrise, we biked 5km into the city of Palma. Ahead of us, the sky was pink and purple, and we could see a huge castle in the distance. Palm trees lined the bike path to our left, and motor/sail boats filled the harbour on our right. In Palma, we had breakfast at a cafe, found out a ton of information at the tourism office, bought a new map, grocery shopped, and found wifi at a cute little tea salon where we searched for available hotels.

We biked 10km along a coastal bike path to the beach town of Can Pastilla. The waves occasionally sprayed us as they spilled over on to the bike path, and the sea breeze pushed us along. The first 6 hotels we found were completely booked. We think it's because the winds have been perfect for parasailing and windsurfing. As we biked into the town, we saw over 50 parasailers and windsurfers out on the water. It was quite a sight, almost like a playground out at sea. We eventually found a place to stay and settled in for the night.

Today, Tuesday, we biked back through Palma and then north to the town of Bunyola. We stopped at an outlet mall for shopping (aka looking) and lunch about 20km into our ride because it started down pouring. The sun came out about an hour later, and we continued to make our way to Bunyola where we were going to pick up a trail head and go for a short hike. My cold has been lingering on, so I decided to take a bus back to Palma while Erin and Amie went for the hike.

Back at the hotel, Erin and Amie cooked a delicious whole wheat tortellini and setan dinner, and we spent the evening planning our next few days of adventures.
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